Philip K. Dick and Philosophy

by D. E. Wittkower

  Verrick’s complaint is inappropriate. The random rotation of office is purposively designed to stop anyone from holding power too long, lest they abuse it. As Major Shaeffer reveals, Verrick was close to removing the random element altogether, so he could hold on to power. That’s all the more reason to remove him, before he became too dangerous.

  There’s nothing rational or irrational about the Bottle in itself, but there are very good reasons for people to use this random mechanism (accompanied by the Challenge) in appointing their rulers. Where there are good reasons to employ a lottery, it’s perfectly rational to do so.

  Giving and Selling

  Choosing rulers randomly may still seem like a bad idea, since it can result in people being picked who don’t want office, while those who want it aren’t selected. But, really, this could be one of its advantages.

  Plato warns that we should be suspicious of those, like Verrick, who want to rule. Having invested so much to win power, they’re likely to seek personal gain from it. Plato thinks this is another reason to favor rule by philosophers. He thinks philosophers would regard rule as an onerous duty and need to be compelled to take office. Maybe it’s not such a bad thing if those selected for office don’t have to be ambitious and powerhungry in order to get there.

  There might be good reasons why some prefer to avoid serving in office. Perhaps we should allow people to exempt themselves from being picked by the Bottle if they wish. Rather than exclude them completely though, we could allow them to nominate substitutes to serve in their place. This means that, instead of everyone having an equal chance of being picked, those who wished to avoid office could transfer their chances to those that wanted it. Some would have no chance of selection and others would have greater chances, corresponding to the number of supporters they had (who’d given them their power cards).

  Such a system would be less equal, but better respect people’s choices. Rulers wouldn’t be chosen completely at random, but a random element still operates—along with people’s choices—to determine whose ticket (or power card) is chosen.

  The society described in Solar Lottery goes further than this. Not only can power cards be given away, they can also be bought and sold. The result is that those with money can buy political power, or at least a greater chance of it. Assuming it’s permissible for people to give power to others, why shouldn’t we let them sell it too?

  Some people think that government shouldn’t interfere with individuals’ private choices, including any contracts they wish to enter voluntarily. Not everything we have can be voluntarily transferred though, much less sold. You can’t choose to give someone else your job. And we don’t always permit people to sell what we allow them to give. You’re free to donate your bodily organs or to have sex with any willing adult partner you can find, but the selling of organs or sex (prostitution) is commonly criminalized. It doesn’t follow from the fact that you can give someone else your vote or power card that you also have the right to sell it to them.

  We might think that people shouldn’t be allowed to buy political office for the same reason that Plato was suspicious of those who want it. If people buy office, they’ll likely seek to profit from it, which would make them bad rulers for the rest of us. Buying and selling of offices is also likely to increase the social divide between rich and poor, as the rich come to own not only luxury goods but positions of power and prestige.

  American society is already unequal, but at least those born at the bottom have the in-principle opportunity to rise to the top (the ‘American dream’ of social mobility). The emergence of a formal division, like that between the classified and unks, would destroy this opportunity. As Cartwright realized, there’s no reason for the unks to continue to play by the rules of the game if they find those rules stacked against them. Lani Guinier, whose proposals for electoral reform led to her being smeared with the racially-loaded title of ‘Quota Queen’, had much the same thought about American politics.

  Many recent advocates of lotteries for political offices have been trying to reduce the undue influence of money in contemporary politics. Allowing people to buy and sell their chances would undercut the democratic rationale of ensuring equal chances for all and representative government.

  One day we may have pre-cogs who can be trusted to rule over us. Until then, Dick points to possible political reforms, which worked for the ancient Greeks and may still be useful to us today. Solar Lottery reminds us that we shouldn’t trust wholly to chance, but need to combine any selection mechanism like the Bottle with a check like the Challenge (though perhaps not exactly like it). Just as important though is the warning to be wary of those, like Verrick or Cartwright, who would seek to tamper with the random machinery for their own ends. As Plato knew, the machinations of men who seek power can be more dangerous than any lottery.8

  11

  We Can Manipulate You Wholesale

  LOUIS MELANÇON

  There’s an early scene in Total Recall when Quaid is at work and has a conversation with his buddy Harry about using Rekall’s services. There’s a little bit of foreshadowing with Harry’s emphatic suggestion that Quaid stay away from that company. And the movie dives straight into telegraphing when the camera closes in on Harry as the two of them return to work and we can see Harry’s shifty eyes giving Quaid a wary measure.

  That’s how you can always pick out the bad guys—they have shifty eyes. This is confirmed a few scenes later when Harry and some goons snatch Quaid with the intent to cause him significant harm in as much as they plan on killing him. Well, we know for sure now that Harry is at least a bad friend, but possibly even a bad person. After all, the bond with Quaid is based on deliberate deception geared towards the directive manipulation of Quaid’s actions.

  What unfolds for the audience is that Harry has been directed to befriend Quaid in an attempt to control and direct what he does and, when that fails, he has orders to tidy up the situation, in a bloody fashion if necessary. Is Harry an immoral person, or is his job simply putting him in danger of being damaged morally by placing him in these situations?

  As the movie goes on we find out that the same situation exists with Quaid’s wife Lori, his cab driver, Benny, and confusingly enough, Hauser—an entire other person whose memories, emotions, and motivations have been hidden either in his history, inside his own brain, or both. All these people are establishing relationships with Quaid and then manipulating and directing his actions through deceit and deception to achieve an agenda.

  The deception here is different from that time you claimed to be an astronaut to get that girl’s phone number. The deception and manipulation from all of the individuals is sanctioned and directed by some outside element—the element actually setting the agenda of the relationship. And while the use of an individual by another poses some problems from a Kantian moral perspective, having an outside element which sanctions and directs individuals to perform such activity is potentially enough to have Immanuel Kant spin in his grave.

  Sure I Deceived You, but What about Me?

  This isn’t the only time this type of situation crops up in Philip K. Dick’s work—an outside element manipulating, controlling, and directing a person, often through some form of deception. Two examples we can look at are A Scanner Darkly (both book and movie) and Total Recall (based on the story, “We Can Remember It for You Wholesale”).

  Bob Arctor (in A Scanner Darkly) is in law enforcement conducting clandestine evidence collection, Quail (in “Wholesale”) is in covert action, and Quaid (in Total Recall) is involved in human intelligence (HUMINT) operations and covert action. Each of these have different desired outcomes: for law enforcement it’s to make an arrest, for covert action it’s to have something happen without people being able to attribute it to a true sponsor (and in both Total Recall and its original story, these actions appear to involve lots of shooting and explosions), and for HUMINT the goal is about getting information that would otherwise not be available.
/>   Yes, there are different goals and different terminology, but both undercover police work and government intelligence work are forms of spying. We see a common thread: one party attempting to manipulate another—or perhaps even to dominate the other, as this is often described in real-world study and training, as James McCargar does in A Short Course in the Secret War.

  So how does one person manipulate another? Well, by finding weaknesses and linking desired behaviors to weakness incentives.

  Finding a Lever for Manipulation

  The acronym often associated with identifying and incentivizing weaknesses for manipulation within the study and training circles for spying is MISE: Money, Ideology, Sex and Ego. Sometimes the less salacious version MICE, where C becomes Compromise, is used, but let’s be salacious!

  Perhaps the individual you wish to manipulate is in some cash-flow straits—you could provide some relief. Or you are aware of some sexual peccadilloes that they would rather remain unknown to family and friends—you could offer ways that they could keep this secret. Or perhaps the person just has a huge ego that you could build up to get your desired result or crush to push them back into line if they start to get out of hand.

  Let’s dig into an example with “Fred,” Bob Arctor’s persona within the police department to highlight this in action. “Fred’s” assignment is to establish relationships with various drug users and dealers in order to gain their trust and elicit further information about the distribution system. This will allow him to establish additional relationships with those more-connected drug dealers which he can then use to elicit further information about even higher level drug dealers, all the while sending this information to the LA County Police Department to assist in their greater understanding of the drug network and gain sufficient evidence for criminal prosecutions. The method for “Fred” to do this is to establish a relationship, primarily based on the exchange of money for drugs with someone under false pretenses (namely, that “Fred” isn’t a cop) and slowly build trust through drug use and ever increasing purchases of drugs.

  A situation eventually emerges where the manipulated individual can no longer meet “Fred’s” commercial exchange requirements but a level of trust has been established. So they must assist “Fred” in establishing another relationship with someone with whom they have established trust. This is a deliberately engineered situation where “Fred” is causing the manipulated half of the relationship to unwittingly betray the trust of another for “Fred’s” benefit. His new buddy (or girlfriend) is a means to an end which likely will be just another means to a different end.

  Although the circumstances and desired outcomes are different, the same thing applies to Lori, Harry and Hauser, among others, against Quaid in Total Recall. Each of these individuals has created a relationship to achieve a specific end, which sometimes appear to be at cross-purposes. But the method they use remains the same regardless of goal—establish a relationship with Quaid in order to manipulate him. Quaid becomes nothing more than a means: for Lori and Harry to monitor and prevent his return to Mars; for Hauser to find the identity and location of the rebel leadership.

  Categorically, We Have an Imperative Problem

  Whether we’re talking about “Fred,” Lori, Harry, Hauser, or a variety of other characters in these works the problem is that all are using someone else as a means to their end, principally Bob Arctor and Quaid. This is a moral problem because treating an individual merely as a means becomes a huge violation of the second formulation of Kant’s “categorical imperative,” which claims that people are valuable as ends in themselves and shouldn’t be treated merely as a means. Or, in other words, people deserve respect, and you shouldn’t use them as merely a tool but recognize their intrinsic value as a human.

  This manipulative behavior is devaluing the humanity of the manipulated individuals. In each given situation, the true amount of devaluation may be variable—it all depends on exactly how much of a means the individual is considered to be. Benny, the mutant taxi driver, only slightly devalues Quaid by following him around and tracking his movements (setting aside trying to crush him with a massive drilling machine). “Fred,” on the other hand, is entirely devalued by federal drug agents as they sacrifice his entire psyche. But a Kantian perspective doesn’t allow for any consideration of minor or major devaluation context—it simply can’t occur. Should the devaluation dilemma be avoided altogether by not spying?

  There have been real-world discussions of limiting such activity due in part to this problem of devaluing the humanity of individuals. In the history of this debate in an American context, the largest open discussion of this occurred in the mid-1970s with the Pike and Church Committees which examined inappropriate intelligence activities by a wide variety of US government elements. These committees highlighted a whole slew of ethical dilemmas and some, such as J.E. Drexel Godfrey writing in Foreign Affairs, made a case for spying using primarily technological means rather than through human manipulation.

  There are also those, such as John Langan (in Jan Goldman’s Ethics of Spying compilation) who argue against Mr. Godfrey. The primary line of argument is utilitarian: there are some situations where technological means cannot divulge the information or achieve the end which is sought, or where using humans may be the least intrusive mechanism for achieving the end. This all rests on the assertion that the safety of the larger society requires whatever is the end in question, and so the devaluing of a few is acceptable.

  Utilitarian Doesn’t Necessarily Mean Coveralls

  A Scanner Darkly provides an excellent jumping-off point for this utilitarian argument. As the novel progresses, we find out a few sketchy things about New Path, such as that they own large portions of land that neither federal, state, nor local governments have the capability to examine or inspect through technical means. And it appears that nothing has been gained by human spying efforts by various law enforcement elements to infiltrate or otherwise determine the business model and practices of New Path. The utilitarian line of argument seems to hold some water. This gains even more traction when placed in the context of the horrifying effects of a Substance D addiction, the ever-increasing population using and addicted to that drug, and the social need to somehow address the problem.

  It could seem acceptable in such a situation to attempt to maximize the positive outcomes for as many people as possible at the expense of a few. Enter Bob Arctor. Unknown to him, as either “Fred” or Bob Arctor, he has been selected by federal agents to be one of these sacrificed few—manipulated into an ever-increasing addiction to Substance D to the point of mental breakdown while having the stimulus of little flowers reinforced into his subconscious for an eventual penetration of New Path’s work farms assisted by a small network of recruited spies aware of portions of the plan. Not only is Bob just another means to the end being sought by law enforcement; it seems he will likely never recover enough to truly be an end himself again—to be an able-minded and self-determining person.

  This is a pretty harsh conclusion for Bob Arctor, and there’s no denying that he was damaged through this spying—the use of Substance D, compounded with the deceptions he was perpetrating on those he was seeking to gain information from, and his unwitting use by others to be placed in a position to access additional information. But the potential outcome hinted at the conclusion of the story is that the source of Substance D, New Path, could be eliminated, preventing continuing addiction to the drug. The Kantian rebuttal to all this is that the actions which made Bob to be acted upon should never have occurred, even were society to collapse because the actions were not taken.

  We see the damage to the manipulated, but there are some other considerations too. We might feel sorry for Bob Arctor, but Quail was a professional assassin. We might not have as much concern that he was deceived by the Imperial Police and himself in order to cover up his various shooty-explody adventures. And Quaid (well, Hauser) doesn’t appear to be such a nice guy so maybe the deception migh
t have inadvertently turned Quaid into a better person. Stranger things have happened. So there is a tension here. And in recognizing the tension we can highlight one item that is often overlooked: the potential for moral damage on the part of the manipulator. Could there be an even larger victim—the person who wittingly violates and disregards the categorical imperative?

  Only Remembered as the Blonde Shot in the Head

  Let’s rewind back to Harry and Lori, Quaid’s two minders who were to trace and influence his actions in order to keep him away from Rekall and discovering his true identity. They do some nasty things, these two: they lie, they sleep around on their spouses, and they are willing to kill. But does this make them immoral people? Perhaps we need a bit more context. Going back to the utilitarian argument, they have conducted this naughty behavior as part of a directed plan from a government to whom they owe allegiance, so, while this is voluntary, it isn’t as if they’re doing these things for fun and profit (as far as we know). Maybe they aren’t immoral people at their core. It could be that these actions, repugnant as they might seem to an outsider just discovering the deception, are saving thousands or millions of lives. If this is the case, then perhaps we could overlook their brutish behavior?

  But we know this isn’t the case. The government they serve isn’t particularly moral itself. Rather than focus on the safety and well-being of those they have been appointed to rule, the administration is about maximizing profit, ensuring production is maintained, and resolving disagreements between the rulers and ruled with the one-way dialogue of the truncheon and rifle. True, there is hesitancy about activating the alien device—it may be a bomb—but based on other actions in the movie this is likely simple self-preservation. But, it isn’t very interesting to talk about immoral people working for an immoral government. Let’s set aside what we know about the Martian government and assume that it is maybe amoral, but not outright immoral.